Fliers advise stores closed on Thanksgiving

BANGOR – Sale day is sale day, right? Not in Maine. The state’s blue laws prohibit retail businesses with more than 5,000 square feet of selling space and more than five employees from operating on Thanksgiving Day.

The national ads in newspapers and on television and radio may tout stores being open on Thanksgiving Day because large retailers are allowed to do so on the holiday in other states.

That means some national retail stores make their special sale flier prices available in Maine on Wednesday and others wait until Friday and Saturday, but none of them can actually be “Thanksgiving Day” sales.

For example, Kmart put a full-page color ad in Wednesday’s Bangor Daily News starting its national sale a day early and notified Maine residents that the stores would be closed on Thanksgiving Day. Some of the fliers in today’s edition of the NEWS also carry notices of the Thanksgiving Day exception in Maine.